Bluebird team to attempt new electric land speed record

The team behind the Bluebird will be making a second attempt on the UK electric land speed record at Pendine Sands on 13 and 14 August 2011.

Driver Don Wales and his team will be heading to the beach to try and break the existing UK record of 137mph, set in 2000 by Wales himself.

The team's first effort at the beginning of July had to be called off when an important part of the car failed to arrive in time.

The South Wales location has seen plenty of attempts on UK records in the past, including by Don Wales' grandfather Sir Malcolm Campbell in 1924 when he set a then-fastest speed in a combustion engine of 146mph. Wales intends to aim for a speed of 150mph on this occasion.

The UK record is not the ultimate goal however, as the team is using this run as an opportunity to test batteries and hardware for an attempt on the world speed record for an electric car in 2013, when they hope to break the 500mph mark. That would comfortably pass the 307mph set by the Buckeye Bullet 2.5 team in August 2010, and would also beat the wheel-driven record, which stands from 2001 at 458mph.

The team would have to relocate should they go for the overall record, with the Edwards Air Force base in California the most likely destination.

There will be several other runs between August and the world record attempt in 2013 with the record expected to creep ever closer in the process.